Oppositional decoding as an act of resistance

This essay, based on a reading of 10 years of the “No Comment” feature of Ms. magazine, argues that when submitting insulting advertisements and clippings from various mass media for republication in Ms. , readers are engaging in oppositional decoding. That is, the readers are resisting the “preferred readings,” to use Stuart Hall's term. The essay speculates why such oppositional decoding is a satisfying group process for the Ms. readership; it also notes that the fact that a particular interpretive community might decode oppositionally presents another challenge to conventional linear models of communication.